Traumatized Elephants Stop to Listen as Soon as Man Starts Playing for Them

At a rehabilitation center for elephants in Thailand, classically-trained pianist Paul Barton brings a musical touch to help soothe the traumatized residents of Elephant World.

The first time he played music for the elephants, an old blind elephant named Pla Ra was behind the piano by coincidence. Pla Ra was one of the many residents of the sanctuary for sick, abused, retired, and rescued elephants in Thailand.

“Pla Ra was having his breakfast and elephants are hungry, so it was unusual when Pla Ra stopped eating with a mouth full of banana leaves protruding from the sides of his mouth and just listened to the music,” Barton told Reuters.

Barton returned to continue playing music for the elephants.

Almost 80 percent of the 3,000 elephants at tourist venues in Thailand, Cambodia, India, Laos, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, endure poor living conditions and diets and are overworked, according to the animal welfare group World Animal Protection.

In Thailand, elephants originally worked with humans in the logging industry. However, in 1989, due to deforestation and the resulting devastating floods, the government banned logging.

While this was good for the environment, it posed major challenges to the elephant owners to maintain the upkeep of their hungry elephants, who eat one-tenth of their body weight every day in an ideal setting.

It was estimated in 1900 there were 100,000 elephants in Thailand.

Today, their numbers have decreased to an estimated 3,000 domestic and 2,000 in the wild.

Elephant World began in 2008 when veterinarian Dr. Samart and his wife, Khun Fon wanted to help provide a home and food for small numbers of elderly and injured local elephants in urgent need.

Through fundraising over time, Elephant World is now fully self-supporting and has 130 staff and 30 elephants in their care.

“When Paul started playing piano for the elephants, I felt that the elephants understood the music, because music is a universal language,” Elephant World sanctuary owner Samart Prasithpol told Reuters.

The elephants do seem to really enjoy the music, although one youngster seems to prefer playing to listening.

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Young people are increasingly rejecting inhumane animal activities

A new poll, commissioned by World Animal Protection, shows a meaningful shift in the way travelers view inhumane animal activities such as elephant rides, swimming with the dolphins excursions, and animal selfies.

For all ages, the poll found a 9 percent drop in the number of people who believe elephant riding is acceptable compared to three years ago. Over 80 percent of tourists stated they would prefer to view animals in their natural environment.

The poll also found that millennial travelers were the most compassionate age group. Jennifer Yellin, Senior Vice President at Northstar, a research firm that conducted focus groups for World Animal Protection said in a press release, “There is a relationship between age and travel activity choice when it comes to animal welfare. For example, people under 35 are more aware of animal cruelty issues. This age segment, more so than older travelers, voice greater interest in seeing animals in their natural habitats rather than forced interactions like swimming with dolphins.”

Young people are known for their interest in traveling and enjoying experiences over material possessions. The desire to have exciting experiences can draw people towards inhumane animal attractions, which often promise hands-on opportunities to play with and take photos of wild animals. Despite this, young people seem to be conscientious of animal welfare when making traveling decisions.

Animal attractions are a common site throughout the world. To unsuspecting travelers, these attractions may seem like a safe haven for wild animals. After all, inhumane animal attractions often try to market themselves this way by using words such as “sanctuary” and by claiming they rescued the animals.

A comprehensive study that examined the welfare of animals in 24 different types of wildlife attractions found that 14 attraction types had negative animal welfare and conservation impacts including captive dolphin interactions, elephant parks, and tiger encounters.

The elephant parks in Asia are a particularly prominent animal attraction. There has been a 30 percent rise in the number of elephant attractions in Thailand since 2010. These attractions offer opportunities to ride, touch and bathe elephants.

According to World Animal Protection, elephants used for rides undergo a cruel breaking-in process where they are isolated, restrained and struck at a young age to make them accept human riders. A survey by Animal Nepal of 42 elephant safaris found that over 80 percent of the elephants lived in unsuitable conditions.

The new poll shows a promising change in consumer attitude towards animal attractions, especially among the new wave of travelers.

“It’s very encouraging to know that young travelers are increasingly considering the wellbeing of animals in their plans. We know that vacationers don’t want to harm wildlife, in fact polling shows that most people participate in harmful wildlife attractions because they like animals. This movement away from captive wildlife attractions is about education and working with travel companies to improve policies,” says Josey Kitson, Executive Director of World Animal Protection Canada in the press release.

The poll comes a few years after TripAdvisor announced that they are no longer selling tickets to attractions where travelers can touch wild animals and Instagram announced that wildlife hashtags will come with a notification warning about potential animal abuse.

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